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“Vindictive” staff at a private psychiatric hospital used by the NHS allegedly taunted young patients saying “your parents have left you”, a damning report reveals.

Adolescents were allowed to self-harm with objects they found in the rubbish, while four allegations of sexual assault were reported by patients supposedly under “constant observation” at Cygnet Hospital in Woking, Surrey.

Watchdogs shut down parts of the facility earlier this year after parents and NHS bosses, who pay for services, raised the alarm.

A new investigation by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) found that other comments from staff to patients reportedly included “if I broke your arm it doesn’t matter”.

One patient also alleged a staff member failed to intervene when the patient tried to tie a ligature around their neck.

Investigators found that staff on the adolescent wards had used physical restraint 839 times in six months, including 88 cases of face-down restraint.

A patient also required emergency help after being given a significant overdose of medicine.

The CQC branded the hospital “inadequate” and ordered improvements.

Two young patients were left to languish in the intensive psychiatric care unit for eight months, and another two for five months, even though the unit is intended for stays of eight weeks or less.

We sincerely apologise for falling short of the high standards the young people we supported and their families had the right to expectCygnet Hospital Woking

Cygnets Hospital, which received 11 inspections in seven years, has now apologised and promised to act on the report.

Last year it became the centre of a row when an autistic 15-year-old, who had been sectioned, was kept on a mental health ward there for six months because the NHS had no spare beds for him at an appropriate specialist unit.

There is currently an acute shortage of adolescent mental health beds available to the NHS in England, meaning patients are often treated long distances from their families.

The CQC report also found that at Cygnets none of the nursing staff held specific qualifications for working with young people.

While they had attended an induction, there was no further training beyond the minimum requirement.

Incidents which should automatically have been reported to the local authority were not acted on, the report found, also noting that, despite the high use of agency staff, some shifts were understaffed.

The psychiatric intensive care unit was temporarily closed to new admissions at the time of the inspectors’ visit in June, and it was then closed completely in July.

It has now partially reopened, subject to monthly reviews.

In July Jeremy Hunt announced an intention to create another 21,000 mental health posts by 2021.

The Health Secretary is promising round the-clock, integrated psychiatric services for the first time, including an additional 4,600 specially trained nurses working in crisis centres, although experts questioned his ability to deliver the increases.

The announcement followed criticism by the CQC over “Victorian” standards of much mental health provision, saying 3,500 patients are being locked up in secure wards when they should be receiving treatment.

A spokesman for the hospital said it took the CQC feedback “extremely seriously”.

“Following detailed discussions with the CQC and NHS England, and with their full support, we took the decision to temporarily close the young person’s ward at the hospital to carry out a comprehensive review of the services the unit provides,” he said.

“We sincerely apologise for falling short of the high standards the young people we supported and their families had the right to expect, and for the disruption the temporary closure has caused.”